


how it is

by windwaves



Series: your song is the only thing i hear [3]
Category: IDOLiSH7 (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:08:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26322439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windwaves/pseuds/windwaves
Summary: he can’t call it regret precisely, only that—well, only that some part of him still wishes he’d been able to do it with banri, that will always wonder about what that would have been like.
Relationships: Oogami Banri/Yuki
Series: your song is the only thing i hear [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2050269
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	how it is

**Author's Note:**

> happy banri day

そうなんだね  
so, that’s how it is  
—夜行, ヨルシカ // yakou, yorushika

* * *

i.

he opens his eyes and blinks, fuzzy images sharpening into the shape of curtains and the balcony. his legs are warm under the kotatsu but definitely asleep, his shoulders are cold because his jacket must have slipped off.

he can still faintly smell the beach, lingering warmth of being held by someone, but it’s fading away now. he’s in his apartment by himself, head in his arms, paper under his fingertips. he must have fallen asleep, and dreamed.

“a dream, huh?” he murmurs. had it been a sad one? he doesn’t think so, but his sleeve is damp, and there is a hollowness that seems to ache as he curls around himself. 

what has he forgotten?

ii.

“did you grow your hair just to cover up the scar?” it's faded with time, even if the shape of it is still clear if you're looking for it. 

“actually, i was going to cut it,” banri says, “the president said it was fine if i wanted to grow it out.”

“how kind of him.”

“he told me ‘if it obstructs your vision, then you should cut it. to see the future, nothing should block your sight,’”

“very inspiring,” yuki comments.

banri laughs. “the president has a way with words.” yuki studies him, and thinks banri looks less tired than he used to. but oh, how they have changed since those days, how far their paths have diverged.

this hadn't been the future yuki had imagined then, he thinks. even if it's the life he's living now and he's happy with it, sometimes he still thinks about their what ifs and almosts.

”so, did you see it?”

”what?”

”the future.”

banri smiles into his drink. from this angle, he looks the same, almost. it makes yuki's heart ache a little. “i did.”

“what did it look like?”

banri's face softens. “you. singing your songs to people who would listen with all their hearts.”

the words are quietly devastating, and banri must know it too, from the way he turns to look at yuki.

“i was happy enough that you heard me,” yuki whispers. there's something twisting in his chest, fragile and tender and unbearably painful.

banri's fingers are gentle when they brush his bangs back. “that doesn't mean the world shouldn't.”

it hurts so much to hear that, because yuki then would have given everything up for banri. he nearly did, and banri stopped him doing it by leaving. if he had given it up then, he wouldn't have this happiness he has now. but as happy as yuki is now, there is still so much pain from then he'd only ever put aside for a while, because thinking about it hurt _so much._

“i'm going to cry,” he tells banri, matter of fact. then it floods out of him, all the tears he thought he'd finished crying. he cries because banri left him, left for him, so that he could be more than he had been. he cries for those difficult years, the fumbling afterwards and the uncertainty, wondering if he'd driven banri off like he'd driven everyone else off. he cries for the dreams they gave up and the years between then and now, for their incomplete selves now walking different paths.

banri just pulls him close and lets yuki cry into his shoulder, rubbing soothing circles over his back. the tears won't stop, even as yuki wipes his face again and again.

he's probably a mess, but then banri's seen him worse than this before. it doesn't stop him from pressing his face into banri's shoulder, willing the tears to stop even as banri holds him.

iii.

it's slow. they talk late into the nights, phone calls to bridge this space between them. banri falls asleep sometimes and yuki just listens to him breathe, finds reassurance in that. he writes a new song and quashes the urge to call banri straightaway to find out what he thinks, if he wants to write another song with yuki.

they have changed so much from those days, building different lives. yuki makes his own dinners and changes his own guitar strings. he tidies up after himself and remembers to make it to places on time, even if okarin or momo still need to barge in every other morning to make sure he's awake on time. he doesn't think much about banri, and banri doesn't answer his texts so quickly. he's not banri's priority anymore, or banri's to look after.

it's strangely lonely somehow, the realisation he's grown up and his life doesn't revolve around banri the way it did all those years ago. because it had—in waiting for banri to come home, to remind him to make it to gigs, to sit across him at their tiny dining table eating instant noodles or konbini dinners.

he does a lot of things on his own now, and he should be proud of it. if banri then could see him now, how far he has come. he can’t call it regret precisely, only that—

well, only that some part of him still wishes he’d been able to do it with banri, that will always wonder about what that would have been like.

iv.

there's a knock at the door and it opens to reveal banri, who tosses a can at him. yuki catches it on reflex, turning it over to find it's the green tea he used to drink.

“i didn't know you'd be here today,” yuki says.

“mezzo" is on set today, and i heard you guys were here. so i came to say hello," banri says. he has a can of coffee and a bottle of momorin; that has to be for momo. “where's momo?”

“he's filming now, i think. he might have left for the other job already.”

“ah. that's a shame.” he sets the bottle down anyways. yuki will take it with him; it's not like he doesn't keep a few bottles at his apartment for momo.

“have you been very busy?” yuki asks. the can opens with a soft hiss, the tea is sweeter than he remembers.

“kind of. lots of things are happening, events and all that.” banri runs a hand through his bangs, and yuki wonders if he's imagining that banri looks very tired.

“are you eating properly? getting enough sleep?”

banri's smile is lopsided, teasing. “shouldn't i be asking you that?” he asks, “you're worrying too much, don't you think?”

“no.” yuki's response is swift and blunt. “ban is important to me, after all.” maybe it's not his place, but yuki knows himself well enough. banri is not his, might never be his. but for a moment in time, banri had been everything he needed. even now, yuki doesn't think he will ever stop needing banri in some way or another. just less, just differently. right now though, he mostly needs to know banri is happy, that he isn't pushing himself too hard.

he doesn't pretend he knows how banri feels about him or the years they have put behind them, but it's always been easy to lean on banri and to reach for him. harder now, with all the distance and pain between them.

but when banri reaches out and curls his fingers around yuki's, maybe it's really not as difficult as it is in his head.

“you're too kind, yuki,” banri says with a smile. yuki doesn't know what he means, because yuki knows himself. he knows he is difficult and disagreeable and demanding. and selfish, so terribly selfish. he wants to be first, the most important thing in someone's life. he wants to keep so many things to himself instead of sharing them, put them in safe places where only he is allowed to have them. but he can't, so he makes do with whatever he can have.

still, if only for now, if just for now, he has banri. for this moment, it's enough to squeeze banri's hand in his, to know that banri is fine, that he is here.

v.

dinner is a simple affair, just soup and rice and some vegetables. it's the kind of dinner they used to eat most, when money was just barely enough. yuki cooked, because it was easier than going out, because he can now.

“was it supposed to be this hard?”

“was what supposed to be how hard?” banri asks, raising an eyebrow.

“growing up,” yuki says.

banri's chopsticks pause, yuki stares at his rice bowl. he doesn't know who else to ask, not when his parents have always let him be more than not, and banri had really been the only one who ever looked after him.

“i think you did a good job,” banri says gently, “you've done a lot to be proud of.”

somehow, those words feel very hard to swallow. he's wanted someone to say that to him for a long time, to tell him he did alright, that he's made it now and things should be easier. it is and it isn't; because it doesn't feel like he's stopped grasping blindly, trying to figure out what to do next now that banri's notes and directions have run out.

“does it get easier?” he asks.

“i hope so,” banri says, his expression softening. “we're only twenty something, still.”

vi.

someone is shaking him, but he's so tired. it's easier to keep sleeping, to ignore it. they'll leave him alone if he doesn't respond.

“yuki.” the voice is so familiar, calling his name. there's a gentle hand in his hair, someone’s thumb across his cheek.

it takes too much effort to open his eyes, but he does. banri's concerned face greets him, and yuki blinks a few times, just to make sure he's not imagining it.

“ban.” the shape of his name is so familiar in yuki's mouth.

“you were crying in your sleep,” banri says. yuki blinks, and realises his cheeks are damp.

“oh,” he says, in a small voice. what _had_ he been dreaming about? he can't remember.

“hey,” yuki blinks and looks up at banri, whose face is creased with concern. “are you okay?”

he’s about to say yes, reassure banri he’s fine. but the words don’t come out.

it’s a startling realisation—he doesn’t actually know if he’s okay.

vii.

there's a dream he has, sometimes.

it's the end of summer, the cicadas are screaming loudly. he's standing in a field as the sun sets, the wind making the flowers dance, tugging at his hair.

sometimes he has his guitar, other times it's just him and this ache in his chest. a song on the edge of memory, that he always forgets when he wakes up. he only ever remembers how it feels like some kind of yearning, aching, longing that cannot take form. 

it has to be a sad song, he thinks. it has to be, to leave him feeling like this in its wake.

viii.

_i dreamed you were gone, ban. isn’t it funny? i dreamed you were gone then i woke up, and you were still gone._

_i don’t know if it’s better or worse than the dreams when you are there._

ix.

writing a song you can’t remember is terribly difficult, yuki finds. his fingers form chords, pluck strings, something terribly familiar about the pattern. but it doesn’t feel like the right one, and he frowns as he tries something else.

that’s how banri finds him, sitting cross legged on the floor, guitar in his lap. he doesn't say anything, just sits across yuki and yuki hands him the guitar. he pulls his knees up and rests his chin on them as he watches banri run over the strings to check the tuning, playing a few chords to test.

c, a minor, f, g, the way he always prefers.

“capo?” banri asks. yuki hands it over and watches banri set it up, testing a few more chords. when he's pleased with whatever sound the guitar is making, he starts plucking.

it sounds familiar, like one of the many unfinished songs they’d started. yuki knows he's forgotten a lot of things from then in an effort to make it all hurt less, but maybe banri remembers what he can't. maybe that's what he's been dreaming about, those things that are half imagination and half memory.

he just listens as banri plays this half remembered song, making mistakes because memory is strangely fickle and faulty, and somehow so very resilient. maybe there were lyrics, because yuki remembers there was a melody to this.

he finds himself strangely unwilling to pick up a pencil and jot these things down, whatever little he remembers, whatever chords banri is playing now. maybe because it belongs in the past, in their tiny apartment so many years ago, where the sun came in too bright in the morning and the curtains were too thin. when winter was freezing and summer too hot, always too much paper scattered over every available surface, the sound of their laughter and the neighbour’s tv on too loud.

maybe it just wasn't a song they were meant to finish. just remember sometimes, between the two of them.


End file.
